Sarah & Sally
A Friendship Deepens
Sarah looked up as the door of her office opened. She’d been trying hard to concentrate on balancing the books, but nothing fitted with anything else, though she knew it was due to her own lack of concentration.
More than once she’d stared through the internal office window, to where the girls were working, and had watched them, heads down, guiding material through the sewing machines.
The knock on her office door was a welcome distraction and Sally entered. ‘I’ve made you a pot of tea, love. You look all in.’
‘I am, Sally. Me life just seems filled with complications.’
‘D’yer want to talk of it? I’m a good listener. Comes of me early days when, if I opened me mouth, it were shut for me.’
Wanting to talk about anything except what had happened at the station, Sarah picked up on this from Sally. ‘I don’t know how you got through everything, love. Though it ain’t as if you have really, is it? I mean, you don’t want to give of yourself – like in having a boyfriend, or owt.’
‘Is it that obvious? But then, you’re right, so it must be. Problem is, when something happens like it did to me, it sort of shuts you down. I can love folk. I love Hattie like she were me mam. Mind, she has been really, cos I can’t remember that much about me own mam, nor about me sister Janey. I suppose it hurts too much to do so.’
‘Aye, I understand, as same thing happened to me: I lost me sister. Anyroad, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have took the subject up with you.’
‘It’s all right. Don’t worry over it. I should speak of it more, but I’ve never had anyone as I could talk to. I can’t talk to Hattie as it hurts her too much. She still feels full of guilt, no matter how I try to reason with her. Occasionally, something will trigger a conversation about what happened, but her remorse is such that I don’t feel I can open up about my deeper feelings. I’m always trying to convince her that she had to do what she did. That I understand how she trusted the police when she convinced my poor mam to agree to use me as bait to expose the child sex-ring that Lord Byron was mixed up in. It wasn’t her fault that the police held back from swooping in in time to save me from the rape.’
‘I can’t imagine what that felt like. If you ever want to talk about it, I’ll listen. I – I don’t know as I could take your pain away, but I do know it helps to unburden yourself.’
‘Ta, Sarah. Maybe if I can do that you can convince Hattie that she weren’t to blame – the police were. After all, once she realized the police were waiting for the whole gang to be assembled and that that had put me in grave danger, she risked her life to save me. I mean, I wouldn’t be here now if it weren’t for her actions.’
‘It’s funny, but we have a lot in common, don’t we? I lost me mam and me sister and so did you, and both our sisters were murdered.’
‘Can you remember yours?’
‘No, not always. I try, and every time I see a Mongol child I like to think it is Bella. I remember more of the things we did, and how she was, than what she looked like. What about you?’
‘Not really. I’m the same as you: it’s more an impression of her, but the events – they’re like an open sore in me.’
An urge came to Sarah to take hold of Sally’s hand. When she did, it felt cold, as if it had never, ever been warm. Suddenly she wanted to hug this girl whom Hattie had adopted, and who seemed always to have been in Sarah’s life, and yet, though a friend, she’d never really been close to. Sally moved at the same time and they came together. The hug held love. ‘Oh, Sally.’
Tears spilled down Sarah’s cheeks. She brushed them away whilst Sally clung to her as if she’d never let her go.
When they did release each other, they started to giggle. The giggle built into a belly laugh that doubled over their bodies. ‘Eeh, Sally, we’re a pair of dafties. But I feel as though we’re special friends now, and I’m in need of one of them.’
‘Me, too, lass, and apart from Hattie, and a bit as I feel for Harry, I’ve a feeling in me as I haven’t experienced in a long time. Like I can love another. I know it’s childish, but . . .’
Sarah curled her little finger around the one offered by Sally, and they shook on it, like two little girls in the playground, before bursting out laughing again.
For Sarah, the laughter held a release from the pain of her granna going, and from the fear of Billy, and the shame of what she’d done with Richard, but it didn’t even begin to touch the part of her where she held Richard in her heart. Nothing could free her of that, and she didn’t want it to.
‘Thou knows, Sarah, there’s sommat as I’d like to share with you. Well, two things. I said as I couldn’t give meself to anyone, but I’ve not been able to get Megan’s stepbrother Mark out of me head. Oh, I know as he’s a couple of years or so younger than me, but—’
‘Sally, you dark horse! Well, I’ve a mind as he feels the same. He never left your side at that dinner party. Oh, what a mess that turned out to be an’ all. I’ll tell you what, I’ll find out what his address is. I know he’s in the navy, but I don’t know if he’s at sea yet, and then you can write to him.’
‘I don’t know as I could.’
‘Of course you could. Start writing as a friend – someone concerned for him – and I reckon as things’ll soon develop from there. Anyroad, you said two things?’
‘Aye, I know we had a laugh about it that evening, but I was serious about wanting to join up. I have a talent as no one knows of. Not even Hattie, and it could be of use. You see, I can speak French.’
‘What? French? How?’
‘When I was forced to live with me aunt, she put me to mending, and that’s how I learned the skills I had when I came back to you all. You remember? I used to help your Aunt Megan when she first set up? Well, back at me aunt’s house, I had work come in from this lady. She were French, and she took it on herself to teach me her language. I just seemed to have a talent for it. I were speaking it in no time. We had long conversations and never a word in English. I think it was because that was the only learning I had. I couldn’t read or write and had no education, and so me brain just soaked up the only academic skill it was offered.’
‘And you can still speak it? You remember enough of it?’
‘Yes, I’ve allus gone over it in me mind, and at night I even talk to meself in it. Then, just recently, I got a book out of the library and started to learn to read and write it. It didn’t seem a problem at all. I could understand and hold a conversation with no difficulty. So I thought, as we were hooking up with the French for this war, it might be as they could use me in the forces.’
‘That’s amazing, Sally, though I don’t want you to go. I feel as though I’ve only just found you proper.’
‘I know. I feel like that too, like I’ve never had a friend afore and now I have. I know we have been friendly and attended parties and been part of the same family, but not like this. But me urge to help is very strong. Only problem is getting Hattie to agree. On top of that, I feel as though Megan really needs me here.’
‘Yes, she will miss you, especially as I’m . . . well, I’m pregnant again!’
‘Again?’
‘Aye, again. And it’d be nice to share that with someone an’ all. Aunt Megan and Aunt Hattie know.’
At the end of her telling, Sally held Sarah’s hand again. ‘By, you’ve had it rough, lass. But everything’s all right now, eh?’
Something held her back from telling Sally it wasn’t. ‘Aye, things are going along. It’s not easy, with how everything is. Anyroad, I’d best pack up now, it’s on half-past two. I’ve done the wages and stuff, and Billy’s at home waiting for me. He came home a day early.’
‘Well, then, what’re you doing here in the first place? Get on home, lass: your man is waiting.’
It was easy to fake laughing with Sally. Everything seemed easy with her, and Sarah wished she’d found this way of them being friends a long time ago. But then it hadn’t been possible to get under the solid wall Sally had built around herself. It had cracked now, though, and she was glad of it. It was going to be good to have someone of her own age to talk to.
The bus trundled along, taking Sarah on her journey home. Though full of fear at what she’d face, her mind was more occupied with Richard and the kiss they’d shared. He’d be home in Market Harborough now. How she wished she was there with him, and he had his arms around her, keeping her safe. Oh, Richard . . .